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Empyre by Josh Conviser
01/12/2007 . Source: Geoff Willmetts 
pub: Del Rey/Ballantine Books. 272 page enlarged paperback. Price: $13.95 (US), $17.95 (CAN). ISBN: 978-0-345-48503-8. Buy Empyre in the USA - or Buy Empyre in the UK  check out website: www.delreybooks.com
'Empyre' is the sequel to 'Echelon', an SF espionage thriller set in a future where cybernetic implants and hi-tech is common-place and where a new danger is implanted in Sarah Peters when she has an up-grade. Unknowingly, she has been infected with a disease which can be turned on by remote-control that wipes out the bosses of the Empyre, a higher covert section of what was the CIA and various places along the way as she flees. On the wanted list, her former colleague Ryan Laing decides to track her down enlisting the help of another agent Frank Savakis and Dave Madda, a tech-installer. To rescue Sarah from the villainous Alfred Krueger before he wipes her memory, they have to solve the Kryptos code that reveals the secret of what is going on.
Encapsulating like this, I have to wonder how much I've said or given away. Author Josh Conviser has a tendency to write at breakneck speed although he did slow a third of the way through this book. With so many threads left open and drawn together, there is a need to keep up with who's doing what and their motivations. Although loyalties are always up in the air, you can't really anticipate who is going to make it until the end. In some instances, I don't think even Conviser knew neither, although whether that was deliberate or the organic feel while writing will have to be left up to you.
Looking at the story as a whole, we don't really see much of the overall world to see the impact any of this derring-do has. I think had this been fleshed out more that it would have been more apparent how sterile this future was becoming. As we're always on the edges of this reality which are a lot dirtier and rough, I ended up wondering just what they are supposed to be saving.
The focus is more on the key players and if you liked the characters from the first book then you're going to be more than happy here.
GF Willmetts
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